Abstract:
Main research purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between the child’s age, disclosure age, child’s health belief, child’s health locus of control, caregiver’s belief in child’s health, caregiver’s expectation of child’s medication uses and antiretroviral drug adherence in school age children. Subjects were 130 school age children with HIV positive/AIDS, 7 to 12 years of age, who were purposively selected from 3 government hospitals. Research instruments were antiretroviral drug adherence appraisal; the questionnaires of child’s health belief, health locus of control and caregiver’s belief of child health and expectation of child’s medication uses. The instruments were tested for content validity and had Cronbach’s alpha reliability of .72, .73, .74, .79 and .81, respectatively. Data were analyzed by mean, standard deviation, Pearson’s product moment correlation and stepwise multiple regression analysis.
The findings of the study were as follows:
1. The retroviral drug adherence of school age children with HIV positive/AIDS was at the medium level
2. The child’s health belief, child’s health locus of control, caregiver’s belief of children’s health and caregiver expectation of child’s medication uses were positively correlated with the retroviral drug adherence in school age children with HIV positive/AIDS at the significant level of .05.
3. The child’s health belief, caregiver’s belief of child’s health, disclosure age and caregiver expectation of child’s medication uses were significant predictors of antiretroviral drug adherence in school age children with HIV positive/AIDS. These predictors accounted for 77.3 percent of the variance (R²= .773 ) and gave a standardized prediction equation of:
Zˆ[subscript antiretroviral drug adherence in school age children with HIV positive/AIDS]
= .754 z[subscript child’s health belief] + .306 Z[subscript caregiver’s belief of child’s health] +.132 Z[subscript disclosure age]